pics of my 54 l and cycling rio 180

54l
i710.photobucket.com/albums/ww101/alkiely/SA400214.jpg

180l gonna plant it up soon
i710.photobucket.com/albums/ww101/alkiely/SA400222.jpg

Hmmmmmmm empty tank with numerous ways of filling it! Im jealous already
Best of luck with it, make sure you keep the pics coming.

Gavin

Yeah i no.......... still dont no what too....... so many ideas all i no is that loads of plants and some bogwood or any wood stuff.

My local shop hasnt really got much of a slection of plants, wood or stone just kiddie stuff like sponge bob etc.

Looking for a good place to get some plants and to talk to someone reading what plants and how to plant them etc

Where are you located??

GB

Hey GB,

Im in north dublin

then your spoilt for choice look at the sponsors section talk to a few of them while the tank is cycling and use the time to scope out which you prefer for fish, decor etc... its the best part finding the right lfs

Yeah ive been looking at a few different opions.... i'm spoiled for choice:P but dont want to go nuts, small plants aruond the front and a few big ones to cover the filter and round the back some wood wanna go for the natural lookin set up.

Its gonna be a community tank but id like to get two puffers it will be well planted so not sure coz ive heard they can attack the other fish so i have been lookin at dwarf puffers a pair coz they stay small enough.

Like to get some advice of any1 with experience with dwarf puffers.

Would hightly recommend Aquatic solutions in Ashbourne, one of the sponsors of this site. Shop isn,t that big but the lads are easy going and give great advice and tips. They can also order in anything you need.Should be easy to get to if your in north Dublin but as Sheag you are spoilt for choice so enjoy your shopping around.

GB

I have heard of that shop but thought they did custom builds etc didnt think they stocked anything in house like plants, fish you can buy?

Yeah im out in finglas so its a 10min drive and while im there i might aswell stop in at the petshop out there.

Went to my local shop today just to see about plants ended up buyin fish....... nutin mad just two lovely lookin platys a pair and he gave me this made lookin fish it is some kind of pleco i think it is about 1.5cm ive tried taking pics of it for here but its just so small it just looks like a brown blob.

Thanks GB for the help.

alkiely i keep dwarf puffers. They are a real pet. Very intelligent and quickly recognise the hand that feeds them.
I never had any trouble keeping them with other fish. I even have them in with some killifish at the moment that have long fins and the puffers dont even look twice at them.
As i am sure you are aware they like to dine on snails as part of their diet.
You could introduce some ramshorn snails in to the tank and they will hunt them down at their leisure.
You could also let the snails reproduce in a tub of water with some java moss. Just trow in a small amount of fish food every now and then. You can just pick them from the tub when you want to feed the fish.
You will have to feed them other meaty foods. Some have no problem feeding them frozen foods but i dont have that pleasure. Mine will only eat live food so i feed them brine shrimp, worms and snails.
If they are in with bigger fish they might hide a lot.

For the tank you could get plants like Anubis, java fern, javamoss or pellia attached to wood or rocks. they can make an instant visual effect.
You could use E. tenellus or some of the vallis for grass type plants.

If you are planning to put loads of plants in the substrate i would empty the tank including the substrate.
Put a sprinkling of moss peat (this will act as a fertilizer for the roots) on the base of the tank. Then get some dirty filter media from an established tank and squeeze it over the moss peat.
Then when you place the substrate on top of this and fill it again the bacteria will colonize the substrate resulting in a speedy set up and less chance of an algae bloom 4-6 weeks down the line.

Go onto the Tropica website and have a look at the 100's of plants they have. Damien in Petstop will order in whatever you want and it wont takwe too long!!